Joshua Wong asks people of Taiwan to show their support for Hong Kong protests
- Activist calls for demonstrations ahead of China’s National Day in a bid to put more pressure on Beijing
- Demosisto leader also calls on island’s politicians to implement measures to help Hongkongers who want to flee the city amid tightening crackdown
Joshua Wong Chi-fung has urged the Taiwanese people and politicians to stage a mass protest ahead of mainland China’s National Day to step up the pressure on Beijing over Hong Kong.
The activist, who arrived in Taiwan on Tuesday for a two-day visit, said he hoped to gain support from the government of President Tsai Ing-wen and the three main political parties.
Anti-government protests have been staged across the city for the past 13 weeks, sparked by a now shelved extradition bill that would have allowed criminal suspects to be sent to the mainland for trial.
“The problems today, including [the failure] to retract the extradition bill, police brutality and the [absence] of general elections are not what [Hong Kong Chief Executive] Carrie Lam can deal with as the decision rests with Xi Jinping,” said Wong, secretary general of pro-democracy party Demosisto.
Wong said the Hong Kong government was considering “imposing a curfew to suppress Hong Kong people” after Lam said her administration would consider using all the laws at their disposal, including colonial-era emergency powers.
The ordinance, last used during the 1967 leftist riots, grants the chief executive authority to “make any regulations whatsoever which he [or she] may consider desirable in the public interest” in the event of “emergency or public danger”.